There’s something about Italian food that feels inherently sensual, amorous and seductive in its sensory pull. The give of fresh pasta between your teeth, a slick of good olive oil on your lips, that burst of a ripe tomato inside your mouth. Pleasures meant to be savored intimately, urging you to stop and slow down. Gianluca Conte’s content doesn’t look like any of that, full of rapid-fire cuts and shirtless shenanigans. It’s manic, louder, faster, and decidedly more chaotic. And yet, it’s magnetic all the same.
Known across social media as @itsqcp, the 26-year-old North Carolinian has turned Italian cooking into high-energy, high-octane entertainment. With over 13 million TikTok followers and almost 9 million YouTube subscribers, he can spin carbonara tutorials into slapstick sketches and transform bruschetta tastings into absurdist routines. He sprinkles basil with his armpit, chugs olive oil like a fraternity pledge, and delights in constantly bewildering his audience. But no matter what he’s filming, his ultimate goal is to entertain through sheer unpredictability — and, somehow, he pulls it off every time.
“I want people to not even know what they just watched, because there’s so much going on,” Conte says while adjusting his wire-rimmed glasses. His expression is serious despite describing content designed to overwhelm and confuse, a contrast that feels at odds with his on-camera persona. That seriousness tracks, though, once you look past the irreverent quips and “buon appetito, bitch.” Because beneath it all is a knowledgeable authority on Italian cuisine.
“There’s just an unconditional amount of love that comes from the kitchen, from how much food will be made,” Conte says with evident passion. “It’s just a given, no matter what household you’re in or where you are, and it’s really a beautiful thing.”
Playgirl • February 2026.
How did you start creating content?
It was kind of a joke at first, in the sense that I was just acting and making any sort of video. I’d posted maybe 500 or 600 videos on TikTok in 2019 before I did my first cooking videos, and they were just me acting like I was from New Jersey. Those videos were more about the entertainment than the food.
As that kept growing, it opened me up to the idea of making the food better, and it happened to help that my dad is a restaurateur. But it took me about three, four months of denial before fully transitioning into cooking content, and I fell in love with it. Now, I’ve been doing it for almost six years, and I just keep loving it more as I get better at cooking.
Why in denial?
I started making videos to promote my music, but I got sidetracked doing stuff that was more about expressing my personality. When the first few cooking videos did really well out of all that random content, I wasn’t sure whether to keep doing that and stop everything else.
What made it feel right, though, was knowing that this is what my dad does. He’s an immigrant who’s been working his butt off to make it since he was 19, and now he owns his own restaurants. It’s like he has four homes that he’s built and developed over the years, with so much hospitality and tons of people coming in. So what I do feels like a modernized version of what my dad does. That’s what felt right, and it helped me get through that denial of wondering whether this was the right thing for me.
I’ve done a lot of content with him at his restaurants and sell my cookbooks there, so we’ve learned how to collaborate in different ways. As father and son, I think it’s really cool that we’ve bonded over that, and I’m very grateful.
That’s really lovely. Lots of immigrant parents tend to have strong opinions about how to approach your career.
I think he believed in me and the fact that I could be different, because of how unconventional his journey was. He constantly says, “I would do exactly what you’re doing if I had that chance and was in your position.”
My dad gives me a lot of confidence. He’s so talented and full of advice that goes such a far way.
He’s always been down to help me with every piece of content. Years ago, there were definitely times I’d call him, and he’d be like, “What are you doing? You can’t make it like that. It’s wrong. You need to do this.” And when I did, my videos got better.
I’ve made content with my entire family, though, and some videos with my sister have gotten over 100 million views. It’s just great to have that kind of support, and that’s what family is about.
How has your content evolved over the years?
My first 50 cooking videos were really character-focused. People loved them, but it was hard for me to feel comfortable with this character being so distant from who I am. Over the years, I’ve become more comfortable and confident with becoming a character. I learned that anytime you’re on camera, you need to be more entertaining than regular, but not too crazy.
It’s been a slow but natural transition. But I also can’t just wake up, stop by the grocery store, make something at home, and call it a day anymore. I want to keep things very original. I don’t want to be seen in the same kitchen more than twice in a couple months, and I want to constantly be on the road shaking things up. If I were to go to my profile right now, my last video is in the desert. The one before is a collaboration in Florida. The one before was with my dad. The one before that is with my mom. Then, I’m in Korea, Japan, the Middle East, or Texas. So it’s not the same as it used to be.
Part of evolving your work is just understanding what people really want to see, and I want to be bringing fresh ideas and keeping people engaged. I’ve always been very receptive to comments and seeing how I can keep making things better. I like to listen to people, because they’re my customers — like with my dad and his restaurants — and I want to make as many people happy as I can. But there are a ton of aspects, whether it’s the brands I work with, the actual content I’m making, saying certain things, not saying certain things, cleaning up humor, making things better, cursing less, or being smarter about what I say.
Based on all that feedback, what do you think draws people to your content?
I’ve thought about that a lot, and I think a lot of the appeal comes from the fact that I really try to bring so many things to one video. I want the food to look good. I want the process to be fun. I’m looking at what I’m wearing, what I’m making, where I’m doing it, the music that’s being played, and the way I edit it.
It’s also like… this guy’s pretty muscular and makes food for a living. That’s kind of intriguing, because it contradicts itself. I was very muscular when I first started making content, and I think that was one of the biggest things that caught people’s attention. It’s why I like to keep my body in the best shape possible, because it’s just one more thing that makes people wonder what they’re watching.
But you also can’t just sit there with a nice body and just cook. That sort of comes back to what I mentioned about bringing in as many things as I can into the picture.
How do Italian viewers respond to your content?
I think they just crack up and laugh. Luckily, I’ve learned a lot of Italian, so I can finally speak with them, and they all love it. I do a lot of content in Italy as well, so I’ve got a good amount of Italian fans, too.
There were times in the beginning where it was kind of just like, “What is this guy doing? What the fuck?” But as I learned to be able to speak better, my comments were just full of things like “your Italian is amazing,” “you’re getting so good at it,” and “that dish was perfect.”
There definitely was a point where I was like, “I need to clean this up, so these Italians don’t hate me, and I can come to Italy and have some appreciation.” Now, I get a lot of love, and I’m glad to have earned that.
A lot of people also think of Italian cuisine as very romantic and sensual. What do you think contributes to this perception?
I think there’s a lot of intense masculinity in Italian culture, and I think that could be seen as attractive. There’s also the way Italians treat food, because it makes you feel taken care of. So I think those two factors come together, and it just creates that sense of comfort. And maybe this isn’t the case for all people, but being taken care of by an Italian is something that girls like a lot. But that’s just from what I’ve heard.
So if you were wooing someone, what would you cook?
It honestly depends on who they are. You have to get to know somebody a little bit and understand what they like, and then you can hit them with your best shot. People always say, “Oh, come on, you’re cooking for girls,” and this and that. But it’s a pretty intimate thing to be cooking for somebody.
Cooking for someone is very casual for me in the moment, and I always forget that it can be received a lot more intensely than it feels, to the point of it being considered a sexy thing. So I really don’t do that that often.
Do you feel like there are any misconceptions about you?
People think that I’m a pretty aggressive person from my content, because I’m high energy. I think it’s gotten a lot better, because that character you see in my content has evolved into someone who’s closer to who I actually am. It’s eased a lot of misconceptions, to the point where the most common thing is “I thought you’d be taller or shorter” or “you don’t have an accent.” Nothing too crazy.
I just used to be so unbelievably insane and chaotic in my videos. Just so nuts that people were nearly scared to meet me. It was like, “Is this guy even a real human? What’s going on here?” Putting on such an intense New Jersey persona isn’t very inviting, so people would meet me and be shocked by how different I was from the content.
Have you ever wanted to pursue cooking in a more quote-unquote traditional capacity?
I still consider myself a home cook. I don’t have any professional culinary training, but I do have a lot of knowledge about Italian cuisine from doing it for so long. If you do anything for a while, you start to get a good grip of it. You can understand things a lot better and grow faster.
I’m confident and comfortable with Italian and Italian American food, but I want to explore other cuisines. I also potentially want to open a restaurant, but I would never do that without being able to have a lot of diversity with my cooking. I want to be super knowledgeable and understand more outside of just Italian cuisine for that. I want to even maybe spark something new. It’s fun to be a pioneer, especially in food.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
Head over to PLAYGIRL+ for the backstage video
